CAVE CITY, Ark. (AP) - Thrilled to be back working on their new, partially constructed home in Cave City, Craig and Crystal Pickering unfolded some lawn chairs in their unfinished living room. The couple recounted how a 10th-anniversary present they had given each other ended up becoming an adventure they won't soon forget.

They boarded the Carnival Triumph and set sail Feb. 7 from Galveston, Texas for a four-day cruise to Mexico. The four-day dream vacation turned into an eight-day nightmare after a fire in the engine room disabled the ship's propulsion, leaving it dead in the water in the Gulf of Mexico for four days.

Crystal told the Batesville Guard (http://is.gd/AzwexB ) that three days into their cruise, they were awakened around 5:30 a.m. Feb. 10 by a female voice over the public address system saying, "Alpha team to the engine room."

"They kept telling people not to go to their muster stations and that everything was OK and it wasn't an emergency," Crystal said.

They weren't alarmed and went back to sleep; however, around 9 a.m. the couple left their cabin to meet up with some friends and realized the seriousness of the situation.

"When we walked out of our rooms, we smelled smoke," Craig said. "We noticed that we had stopped moving."

About every half hour, the same female voice would come over the speakers and say everything was OK.

"She said there had been a fire in the engine room, and when it cooled enough, they could assess the damage," Crystal said.

Twelve hours passed before anyone could go into the engine room to discover there was nothing that could be done to fix the problem, Craig said.

"They told us we would have to be towed back," he said, "and the next morning, the Coast Guard got there, and it was 36 hours before a tugboat got there."

The ship had drifted 96 miles away from Mexico by the time the tugboats arrived, Craig said.

Craig also said he was told by a crew member that the original plan was to go back to Mexico and fly passengers back to the United States, but many of them didn't have passports, which would prevent them from being able to fly out of the country. So the alternative was to be towed to Mobile, Ala.

At this point very few bathrooms were working, and the passengers were told that once their toilets were full to begin urinating in the showers and defecating in red or black plastic bags that had been provided.

"There was raw sewage running down the walls," Craig said. "When the ship would list, the toilets would spill out onto the floor."

He said it would also leak out onto the decks where people were staying under sheets-turned-tents to protect themselves from the sun.

"The first day was so chaotic, the crew was just busy trying to get food and drinks out to everybody," Crystal said.

Because it was close to 90 degrees in their cabin, the Pickerings joined some of the other passengers and dragged their mattresses out to the deck of their muster station, which is where they slept for two nights.

"On the last night, a cold front came through, and we went back to our rooms," Crystal said.

Because there were only two working generators on the ship, many areas were dark, and the refrigeration systems were out, so food was limited.

Crystal said they had choices such as onion and cucumber or mozzarella and tomato sandwiches.

"Our daily routine was to get up from wherever we were sleeping and wait in line for breakfast," Craig said about the two- to three-hour wait in the food lines where they would be given choices such as warm yogurt, fruit, or cereal and warm milk for breakfast.

"Then we would go watch the show with the helicopters and boats and talk to our friends," Craig said. "Then we would go wait in line for lunch."

One night was so dark that the passengers were using their cell phones just to light up the buffet.

"I saw potatoes on the buffet, and I was like, 'Yeah, potatoes!'" Crystal said with a laugh. "I took a bite and spit it out. It wasn't potatoes, it was tofu and olives. By then they were having to get creative with the meals."

Cell service was hit and miss, but occasionally passengers could get a quick call or text out to let their loved ones know they were OK.

"When another cruise ship went by, we could pull a signal," Craig said. "We got a call out to Mom to check on the kids."

There were moments when Crystal said it was almost too much, and she said that night was probably the worst.

"After I talked with my mother-in-law, and she said the kids were crying for us was probably the worst moment for me," Crystal said. "Every day the conditions got worse and worse, and the smell got worse."

"It was nasty, and we were stuck there," Craig chimed in.

Looking at her husband, Crystal added, "And we just couldn't get away from it."

Although helicopters and ships would bring supplies to the disabled ship daily, the last night on the vessel Craig said they ran out of drinking water.

The couple said although the conditions were horrific, people still helped each other, and Crystal said the crew kept smiling and was always attentive to the needs of the passengers.

"People were cranky because they were standing in line for three hours, but nobody was trying to take food off your plates," Craig said with a smile.

"People with balcony rooms would let other people pull their mattresses in to sleep and would let them use their toilets if they were working," Crystal said.

Once the ship docked in Mobile on Valentine's Day, the passengers were herded onto buses and taken on a two-and-a-half hour ride to New Orleans, where they were fed hot meals, given hotel rooms and shuttled to the airport for a flight home the next morning. This would be the first hot shower the passengers had had in several days.

Crystal laughed and said, "I didn't kiss the ground, because I knew where everybody's shoes had been."

This wasn't the first cruise for the couple. They honeymooned on a ship 10 years ago. And although this cruise wasn't ideal, they both said they wouldn't hesitate to go on another one, but there are a few things they said they would do different.

"Research and Google the name of the boat to see its mechanical history," Crystal said. "Pack more clothes, take our own drinks and snacks and get a balcony room."

Carnival Cruise Lines offered the passengers a refund of their cruise and travel expenses, $500 each and a free future cruise.

When Crystal inquired about lost wages and other expenses related to the extra days they were at sea, she said the cruise line refused to compensate her.

"I don't want to get rich off of it, but we just want to get back what was lost," she said.